August

Tuesday

Aug 13, 2013 at 12:01 AMAug 13, 2013 at 12:23 PM

What a beautiful month! And the sweet corn is ripening nicely. Should be able to have some fresh by tomorrow or the next day. I also ate one of the first tomatoes today. Very late for the first tomato, but it tasted so very good.

With the Twins in a state of perpetual mediocrity, I cut off my cable TV subscription this week. That did not please DirecTV which put me in their computer as a delinquent and arranged for a parade of their "account representatives" to call several times this week at weird hours to win me back. Each time I said, no, I was serious, I do not want cable TV anymore. Finally, this morning, I said a whole lot more. I do hope that ends the harassment. Cable TV (or satellite) is losing to the internet, which allows you to watch your shows at your leisure. No wonder the cable companies are panicking.

Poor Lance. My tirade over the phone at DirecTV upset him. He was eating breakfast at the time. He always assumes it is somehow his fault, and it took a while to convince him I wasn't mad at him.

That is the risk of all tirades. I remember telling off a customer once in the middle of the greenhouse. The act was pretty satisfying to me, as I was unquestionably in the right, but later I discovered that my 5-year-old behavior, as fun as it was, upset several employees, as they thought my yelling was somehow directed at them.

It is best not to go into a tirade. But yelling at telemarketers is somehow catharctic.

I am on the edge anyway as I am in the later stages of editing my latest book, which now has a title I am happy with: A Treasury of Old Souls: Tending, Defending and Befriending the Elderly.

With the title in place, I have to go through the stories to make sure they are in line with the title. The title is courtesy of Carol, my editor. She is a genius. She edited the Chicken Soup series, so she knows what sells. But she also knows which of my writing is good and which isn't up to snuff. Once she explains it to me, I understand, and cutting the bad stuff out is painless.

But we have a ways to go.

What a beautiful month! And the sweet corn is ripening nicely. Should be able to have some fresh by tomorrow or the next day. I also ate one of the first tomatoes today. Very late for the first tomato, but it tasted so very good.

With the Twins in a state of perpetual mediocrity, I cut off my cable TV subscription this week. That did not please DirecTV which put me in their computer as a delinquent and arranged for a parade of their "account representatives" to call several times this week at weird hours to win me back. Each time I said, no, I was serious, I do not want cable TV anymore. Finally, this morning, I said a whole lot more. I do hope that ends the harassment. Cable TV (or satellite) is losing to the internet, which allows you to watch your shows at your leisure. No wonder the cable companies are panicking.

Poor Lance. My tirade over the phone at DirecTV upset him. He was eating breakfast at the time. He always assumes it is somehow his fault, and it took a while to convince him I wasn't mad at him.

That is the risk of all tirades. I remember telling off a customer once in the middle of the greenhouse. The act was pretty satisfying to me, as I was unquestionably in the right, but later I discovered that my 5-year-old behavior, as fun as it was, upset several employees, as they thought my yelling was somehow directed at them.

It is best not to go into a tirade. But yelling at telemarketers is somehow catharctic.

I am on the edge anyway as I am in the later stages of editing my latest book, which now has a title I am happy with: A Treasury of Old Souls: Tending, Defending and Befriending the Elderly.

With the title in place, I have to go through the stories to make sure they are in line with the title. The title is courtesy of Carol, my editor. She is a genius. She edited the Chicken Soup series, so she knows what sells. But she also knows which of my writing is good and which isn't up to snuff. Once she explains it to me, I understand, and cutting the bad stuff out is painless.